Chapter 570 The whole story
Operation Prairie Fire began in the summer of 1630. After two or three months of preliminary harassment, the pirate army landed in October to attack the Qiongbei area, and then blocked shipping between Qiongzhou Island and the mainland. From that time on, the connection between Li Qingyang, a sitting detective, and the Mainland Jinyiwei organization was cut off. Afterwards, the Haihan Militia "recovered" the Qiongbei area and took over control of shipping. However, the closure of shipping continued for a long time. It was not until the end of the year that shipping between Qiongzhou Island and the mainland was gradually opened, but from then on Ships from the mainland still need to undergo strict inspections when docking at the port of Qiongzhou Island to prevent spies from sneaking into the island.
Of course, the scale of this investigation is in the hands of Haihan. For example, the information channel for Li Qingyang to submit reports to Nanjing Fusi was reactivated by the Ministry of Security near the end of the year to ensure that Li Qingyang passed some processed information to Nanjing. Go - the content is basically about the critical situation of the pirate army attacking Qiong, and how Haihan bravely prepared for the battle and repelled the invading pirates. Since all Ming government agencies in Qiongbei have been controlled by Haihan, Li Qingyang has almost become the only official channel for Ming Dynasty to obtain information about the changes in the situation on Qiongzhou Island.
However, the news was transmitted all the way from Sanya to Nanjing, and the time required on the road was not short. It was not until nearly two months later, that is, in late January 1631, when Li Qingyang was about to submit a report to Nanjing again, that he did not arrive in Nanjing until nearly two months later. The messenger who came to contact Sanya received information feedback from the Nanjing Zhenfu Division about the Qiongbei Rebellion last year.
Different from the focus of the Guangdong government, the Jinyiwei Nanjing Zhenfu Division did not care much about the losses Qiongzhou suffered in this war, and what kind of help the court needed for post-war reconstruction. This secret order was given to Li Qingyang There was only one thing in the matter, ordering him to try to contact or find Zhao Ye, deputy Qianhu of the Nanjing Town and Fu Division, who went to Qiongzhou on a secret business trip in September last year and had no news at this time.
Li Qingyang was shocked, but he did not try to hide the news. Every written instruction sent from Nanjing, he had to submit to the Ministry of Security for archiving. He immediately informed Lin Nan of the news, and then Lin Nan took him to see Hao Wanqing immediately to explain the situation.
The Jinyiwei organization on Qiongzhou Island has always been under the jurisdiction of Guangzhou, and the reason why the Nanjing Zhenfu Division sent Li Qingyang to lurk south the year before last was because it believed that there were huge work loopholes in the subordinate organizations including Guangzhou Jinyiwei. For Qiongzhou Island Shanghai The supervision of the Han people was not strict enough. However, this arrangement was leaked very early. As soon as Li Qingyang arrived in Guangzhou, he was targeted by Haihan Security Department. Jin Yiwei sent an agent to infiltrate Haihan, but in the end, he became the hand of Haihan Security Department to deal with Jin Yiwei. tools.
The existence of Li Qingyang did bring a period of safety to Haihan's intelligence work. As expected by the Ministry of Security, Li Qingyang's regular reports could indeed paralyze Ming Dynasty's intelligence agencies to a certain extent. But at the same time, everyone knows that this safety period is also limited in time. As Haihan continues to grow and his influence in the southeast region becomes increasingly stronger, Ming Dynasty’s intelligence agencies will face up to Haihan’s existence sooner or later, and may even make some hostile actions. action.
When Li Qingyang left Nanjing, what he learned was that the Nanjing Zhenfu Division did not intend to devote too much energy to Qiongzhou Island, and there were no other arrangements except for the group of people he brought. Of course, the person who made this plan probably didn't expect that not long after the group was sent, only Li Qingyang was left alone in Sanya, and he eventually rebelled against the court.
But the Nanjing Town and Fu Division sent another higher-level official to Qiongzhou Island secretly last year. Li Qingyang didn't know about this until this time, and before that, he didn't even receive the slightest hint of it.
There are two possibilities for this situation: The first is that the colleague who came to Qiongzhou Island was unable to contact him before Operation Prairie Fire started for some reason. If this is the case, it must be the other party's dereliction of duty. ; The second possibility is more serious, that is, when the Nanjing Zhenfu Division dispatched this official, they did not arrange for him to contact Li Qingyang who was lurking in Sanya. In other words, Nanjing's trust in Li Qingyang had declined, so it arranged another route for others to enter Qiongzhou Island.
According to the original establishment of Jin Yiwei, the person with the highest position on Qiongzhou Island was only from the same hundred households as Li Qingyang. The Nanjing Town Fusi arranged for Li Qingyang to come over in the first place so that he could act independently on Qiongzhou Island without being restricted by the local people. Jinyiwei institution. And this time, a deputy Qianhu from the fifth rank was specially sent here, which shows that he attaches great importance to the intelligence work of Qiongzhou Island.
Of course, there is no more precise information as to whether the deputy Qianhu named Zhao Ye came to Qiongzhou Island to deal with Haihan, or whether he had other cases to investigate. The task given to Li Qingyang by the Nanjing Town and Fu Division was only to find Zhao Ye's whereabouts and report back. There was no further arrangement for cooperating with his work after finding Zhao Ye.
To investigate this matter, we must first trace back to the two raids on Qiongbei's officialdom by the Pirate Army and the Haihan Militia during Operation Liaoyuan. In addition to ordinary government agencies, Jinyiwei and Dongchang, as the most important security intelligence agencies of the Ming Dynasty, are also the two key targets of this operation. Except for a few people who had secretly surrendered to Haihan before, the entire Ming intelligence agency in Qiongbei could be said to have been uprooted. Even those who were hidden among the people, had no formal establishment, and only worked part-time with silver rewards. Tandu was not spared.
Even the Jinyiwei Yamen in Qiongzhou Fucheng was not spared. After the Haihan militia stationed in Fucheng, the military quickly surrounded the Jinyiwei Yamen in the city based on the identification of a captured pirate leader, and arrested him for colluding with pirates. The person in charge of the local Jinyiwei. The Jin Yiwei refused to surrender. During the process, the military used force, killing and wounding many Jin Yiwei personnel who resisted. After cleaning up the battlefield, it was found that several of the main leaders of Jinyiwei had died in the conflict. After checking the personnel list, the troops performing the mission brought the matter to an end.
According to the military's verification, they have fully followed the list of personnel provided by the Ministry of Security and arrested the main tasks of the Daming Intelligence Agency in the Qiongbei area. Counting the personnel eliminated by the pirate army, the entire Jinyiwei and Dongchang in Qiongbei , have all been cleaned up. The Ministry of Security took this notice and submitted it to the Executive Committee. After that, both the Executive Committee and the Ministry of Security temporarily relaxed their guard against the Ming Dynasty intelligence agency, because no matter how capable they were, it was impossible to rebuild the grassroots level again in the short term with Haihan strictly controlling Qiongzhou Shipping. Organized.
After the end of Operation Liaoyuan, the Haihan military had checked everyone, including the dead people, according to the list they had, to ensure that no one from Jinyiwei and Dongchang slipped through the net. However, during this process, no one thought that there were still people there. People outside this list lurk on the island.
This time, among the alternate officials sent by the Guangdong government to Qiongzhou Island to fill vacancies, there were no officials from Jinyiwei and Dongchang. According to the information Liu Qian provided to Haihan, the candidates for these two yamen officials would not be decided until the end of February or early March at the earliest. Even if someone comes by then, they will probably be in the same situation as Yan Mingjun and Li Jin. They can only come and take up their posts alone. After all, even for a privileged yamen, the funds and staff are limited. Therefore, before Li Qingyang received this secret letter, the entire security department had temporarily put aside its attention to the Ming Dynasty's intelligence agency.
After receiving the news, Hao Wanqing did not dare to neglect and immediately informed the executive committee. Tao Donglai also quickly issued instructions: No matter the cost, life or death, the fish that slipped through the net should be caught as soon as possible. The Ministry of Security also immediately convened a response meeting. Hao Wanqing believed that this matter was big or small. If there was evidence to prove that this person had died in the previous war, or could be arrested in the near future, then it should be resolved. Can't afford any big waves. But if this person is still lurking somewhere in Qiongbei and secretly reorganizes the troops, then there is no telling when, where and how this time bomb will explode.
A telegram from the Ministry of Security was sent to the militia headquarters in Qiongbei. The militia spent another five days rechecking the arrest list at that time and determined that such a person was not included in the list of those who had died or been arrested. A prominent official. But those who died in the war were not the only people in the Jinyiwei Yamen. It was basically impossible to verify the identities of all the dead people - there were many anonymous people who had been buried in the ground for several months after the war. At this time How else can I check my identity?
Just when the security department lost the clue and was a little unsure of the direction, the navy sent good news. While patrolling the Qiongzhou Strait, they intercepted a merchant ship departing from Haikou Port. When they were making a routine stop to board the ship, someone actually jumped into the sea and fled.
The navy didn't waste any effort trying to catch them alive. The sailors standing on the side of the ship shot them down in a row, and the people who jumped from the ship soon surfaced with bullet holes all over their backs. After the body was fished out of the boat, the sailors quickly found Jin Yiwei's waistband on the body's waist.
The shipowner, who was sweating profusely with fear, could only insist that he did not know the man's true identity. He only took fifty taels of silver from him, hid him in the cargo hold plywood at the bottom of the ship in advance, and sent him to be smuggled to the Leizhou Peninsula to land. The ship owner claimed that he was only in it for the money, but the military did not care whether his confession was true or false, and directly seized the people and the ship.
This matter was quickly reported to Wang Tom. Wang Tom also knew that all the Jin Yiwei in Qiongbei had been wiped out. Theoretically, there should be no fish that slipped through the net, but now that this matter has happened, it is no longer a military family. As soon as the matter was over, a fast boat was sent to escort everyone on the ship, as well as the body of the Jin Yiwei and his belongings to Sanya. In order not to waste time, as soon as the ship here set off, the military notified the base camp by telegram.
However, judging from the waistband found on the body, this body should not be that of the Vice Senhu that the Security Department is looking for, but it is most likely that of his entourage. Another good news is that a secret letter wrapped in waterproof tarpaulin was found on the body. Due to the use of many professional incisions, the military personnel could not understand the content of the letter, so they sent it with the ship. Sanya, interpreted by Li Qingyang.
After receiving this letter, the context of the whole matter became much clearer. The deputy Qianhu of the Jinyiwei named Zhao Ye had led several of his men to leave the city and head towards Danzhou before the start of Operation Liaoyuan. However, they were extremely unlucky and encountered a pirate army attacking the city in Chengmai County. Among them Several of his men died in the war. Zhao Ye escaped from Chengmai County with only one of his men, and then lurked in the wild. He did not dare to go to the big city because the war situation was unclear.
After the Haihan militia recaptured Qiongbei, Zhao Ye spent a long time determining the situation in Qiongbei. It was not until the end of last year, when Li Qingyang delivered a report on the Qiongbei rebellion to Nanjing, that Zhao Ye returned to Qiongbei. A foothold was found near the prefecture - of course, Zhao Ye was not a fool and did not mention the specific location in the secret letter.
After Zhao Ye settled down, he was ready to reconnect with the mainland. Of course, he also heard about the "tragic experience" of the local Jinyiwei through some channels. If he did not want to repeat the same mistakes, then he should not try to reveal his identity to the Haihan people who took over the local area in the first place. So while lurking locally to observe the situation, he wrote a secret report and handed it to his only subordinate, who then went to Haikou Port, the only port in Qiongbei that can navigate to the mainland, to look for an opportunity to sneak back to the mainland.
The other contents in the secret report are basically unfavorable to Haihan, and are completely opposite to the report Li Qingyang submitted to the Nanjing Zhenfu Division. If this kind of thing is passed back to Nanjing, even if no obvious action is taken immediately, it will inevitably affect the importance Jin Yiwei attaches to Haihan.
Fortunately, the militia navy accidentally intercepted the ship carrying this Jinyiwei at sea. He thought that his whereabouts had been betrayed by the crew, so he was intercepted by the Haihan warship. In desperation, he tried to jump into the sea to escape, but it was in vain. Instead, he died in vain.
The letter was sent to Sanya, and after Li Qingyang interpreted the content, the direction of the investigation became clear. If there are no new changes, this deputy Qianhu of Jinyiwei should still be lurking near Danzhou. The only thing left is how to extract him from the local area.
The Ministry of Security immediately made emergency arrangements and gave Li Qingyang his first opportunity to perform foreign affairs. Of course, due to various considerations, he did not go to Danzhou alone. In addition to a team of combatants specifically responsible for special service tasks, there is also Lin Nan, the boss, who leads the team.
(End of chapter)